Generosity & Entitlement

I’ve been trying something new at Moz. I schedule 90 minutes every week or two for “office hours,” and invite anyone from any team at the company to come visit and chat about whatever’s on their mind. So far, attendance has been sparse (only 1 person the first week, ~10 the 2nd week, and 4 each of the last two weeks), but I think that’s a good thing. Hopefully it means that the other channels of communication and feedback are supporting most Mozzers’ needs.

Today, one of our senior engineers, Brandon, stopped by. He was worried about a growing sense of entitlement on the team. About 9 months ago, we talked about the risk of hedonic adaptation at an all-hands gathering, but this engineer felt that those risks were becoming reality. Brandon pointed out some feedback from TinyPulse (a tool we use to gather and report anonymous feedback at Moz) and some of the things he’d personally overheard when socializing around the company. These included complaints about the increased hours and stress associated with our recent launch/rebrand, a lack of availability of particular kinds of food and snacks, challenges with scheduling vacation time, some folks not getting the kinds of hardware/furniture they wanted, and about there not being enough open timeslots when we had a masseuse visit the office.

the hedonic treadmill: an unavoidable result of evolutionary biology

This is a really tough topic for me, because I deeply believe in empathy and generosity (two important elements of TAGFEE), and asking people to just deal with long hours, high stress, a lack of their favorite foods/snacks/hardware, or not getting a massage when others did seems, on the surface at least, to conflict with those values.

Brandon and I had some really good back and forth, and I know his opinion is shared by others at Moz who worry about whether we’re being wasteful or encouraging feelings of entitlement. I tried to state the case from the other side, and it led to a few big topics that Sarah Bird and I have had passionate conversations around in the past. I thought I’d share these here.

Is a Perk a Reward? Does Removing a Perk Constitute Punishment?

No one’s done a better job of writing about what happens when perks get changed and the informal, loose culture of a startup changes to feel like a “big company” than Steve Blank:

One day the engineering team was clustered in the snack room looking at the soda machine. The sign said, “Soda now 50 cents.” The uproar began. Engineers started complaining about the price of the soda. Someone noticed that instead of the informal reimbursement system for dinners when they were working late, there was now a formal expense report system. Some had already been irritated when “professional” managers had been hired over their teams with reportedly more stock than the early engineers had. Lots of email was exchanged about “how things were changing for the worse.” A few engineers went to the see the CEO. But the damage had been done. The most talented and senior engineers looked up from their desks and noticed the company was no longer the one they loved. It had changed. And not in a way they were happy with.

At Moz, we had a period of ~3 years where the hardest part of growing was finding talented software engineers who could tackle projects of the scale and complexity we wanted to take on. Every engineer we interviewed was also being recruited by some combination of Facebook/Google/Amazon/Microsoft. Those companies have a lot of cash, and no fear of using it to lure in talent. But along with direct competition on the salary front, there’s a tremendous number of benefits offered by these firms (with the possible exception of Amazon, who has a famously frugal culture). As we became less financially constrained, we competed in the classic ways – salaries, snacks, office amenities, catered lunches, beer nights, and in some weird and unique ways like paid paid vacation and mashed potato sculpting contests (that one’s surprisingly affordable).

To many who were at Moz during the launch of these new benefits and perks, the announcements were greeted with celebration and glee. We’d been through the tough, leaner times and it felt great to have these visible signs that we’d made progress as a startup.

But you cannot expect that same emotion over time. After a while, we hop on our hedonic treadmills and we get used to those catered lunches and sponsored beer nights and paid, paid vacations. Once we’re used to them, they’re no longer special. They aren’t “perks” we can do without, as we once did. Those are part of our “employment package.” And if we want to make a few extra hires or invest in some new outlay that’s outside the budget plan, too bad. Those benefits are owed to us; heck, they’re part of why we joined the company. If they leave, why shouldn’t we leave, too?

At least, that’s how human nature and evolution have conditioned us to think.

And if management or financial controllers fail to recognize that, I think they’ll find themselves falling victim to the kind of disgruntlement and frustration Steve described in his story about $0.50 soda.

This is a tough problem, and I don’t honestly know the solution, or even how to start. I know that I want paid, paid vacation and miniature candy in the office, and mimosas to celebrate a launch, and 401K contributions to always feel special. But I also know that’s not how we’re wired. I’ve found myself feeling entitled to my very particular kinds of soda being stocked in our fridges and thinking about how to use next year’s vacation cash. I think this will always be a thorny issue. There’s no way to force people to feel grateful, especially when the big company down the street may make even sweeter offers.

What I do know is that we’ve got folks on both sides of this issue at Moz today, and if I had to guess, we’re all actually on both sides of it. Sometimes we feel entitled. Sometimes we feel like we could live with less. Sometimes we wish we could be more empathetic to our co-workers who just worked a long weekend. Sometimes we wish our co-workers would be more empathetic to our customers by launching project XYZ sooner. Historically, when I’ve seen both sides get roughly equal amounts of feedback, my sense is that we’re keeping a healthy balance, and just need to stay vigilant in case the scales tip.

How Do We Reconcile Impact vs. Savings?

Moz is in a lucky position. Despite the fact that our recent launch was significantly delayed and our expenditures this year have been dramatically above budget (mostly contractor spend, additional hosting costs, and hiring a bit ahead of schedule), we’ve got a lot of runway from our funding round last year, and thousands of customers who help us pay the bills. But someday, that could change.

As we’ve been doing budget planning and looking at worst case scenarios (we actually drew one up where 10% of our subscribers quit after we launched the re-brand to Moz, thinking it might be like when Netflix launched Qwikster), we tried to figure out what would happen if, in the months to come, we couldn’t get costs under control, couldn’t get our new product delivered, and were feeling cancellation pain (thankfully, the week since launch has looked pretty darn good). Part of that meant coming up with a worst-case budget that would find cost savings.

There was back and forth about how and what might be prioritized for cost savings. I expressed concern that things like beer nights, catered food, new laptops, or conference travel don’t amount to much compared to our much bigger budget line items like hosting and contractors. What does a few thousand dollars saved each month matter when we’re spending $650K+ at AWS, and another $600K/month on professional contractors?

Sarah made some compelling counter-arguments:

1. Cognitive Dissonance. I wouldn’t feel right telling people they can’t hire a contractor or bring on a new team member, when we spend on fancy catered lunches. I don’t like telling people they can’t get a new desk, when we send mozzers all over the world to conferences.

2. Small Expenses Do Add Up. I know that adjusting our spending policy on any one item will not make a huge financial impact. But lots of small impacts do add up. For example, paid, paid vacation is almost $400k/year. That does impact our finances. Travel too. It adds up. There are at least a couple new hires worth of travel at Moz.

3. TAGFEE Isn’t About Perks. Moz was tagfee before catered lunches, before charity match, before retina screens, before beer night, before mozcation, before it all. TAGFEE isn’t just generosity. TAGFEE is about how we treat others, person to person. Are we respectful? Are we kind? Are we honest? It’s about loving what you do. I think we’d be tagfee even if we had to scale back some perks in times of need. Hopefully people would trust that as we got back to a more stable position, we’d ramp perks back up.

Looking back over these emails now, I feel a lot of relief that our launch has gone well (at least in week one), our hosting/contracting spend is shrinking, and that both revenue and costs are likely to be in a place over the next 3 months where we won’t have to worry excessively about this stuff (fingers crossed, knock on wood, and all that).

But Sarah’s strong arguments do make the conundrum all that much harder. As startups face the highs and lows that inevitably come with growth, we’re challenged to strike a balance between adding perks (that can be emotionally taxing and feel non-generous to remove, should the need arise) and running lean (which can make it feel like the founders/investors are hoarding all the value the company generates).

Much like the situation with hedonic adaptation, there’s no simple solution. Startup founders and boards need to determine where to find balance between adding in new costs that provide benefit to the team and recognizing the pain that might come should those costs need to be unwound. The startups I interact with often think about this when it comes to people and salaries, but sometimes consider neither the value nor pain of benefits spending.

Does Startup Speed Have to Be Constant?

Moz has long been a place where most of us have lives outside of work, even in tough times. Lately, though, with the re-brand and the upcoming release of Moz Analytics, the pressure has been on in a way that’s rarely existed at the company. That pressure, and the long nights and weekends for many engineering team members, has, naturally, led to stress and anguish.

I’m of the general belief that the first 30-40 hours we work each week are the most productive, and that the curve of productivity generally falls off pretty fast after ~50 (especially after 2-3 weeks in a row). In the past 6 weeks, I’ve been feeling guilty about asking all these people to put in extra hours, and as a result, have been pouring in hours of my own (many that aren’t particularly productive or useful). Over Memorial Day weekend, I did 12 hour days both Saturday and Sunday, and stared at my screen on Monday until I realized that I was getting nothing done, so Geraldine and I went to see Star Trek. I felt so bad about taking a few hours away from my computer that I didn’t even check-in on FourSquare. I didn’t want other Mozzers seeing my time-off.

That sucked, and it was totally wrong. As Jerry, my CEO coach, would say, “if you don’t show other people that you take breaks, they’ll never feel like they can take a break, and you’re not being truly empathetic.”

When I talk to other CEOs, and other startup employees, I get this weird sense that Moz is an outlier. I think there’s either A) a lot of very unhealthy (and probably unproductive) expectations around hours or B) a lot of BS about how much time people at startups really spend at work. Maybe both.

Here is a brief sketch of the economic proposition. If you’re a good hacker in your mid twenties, you can get a job paying about $80,000 per year. So on average such a hacker must be able to do at least $80,000 worth of work per year for the company just to break even. You could probably work twice as many hours as a corporate employee, and if you focus you can probably get three times as much done in an hour. [1] You should get another multiple of two, at least, by eliminating the drag of the pointy-haired middle manager who would be your boss in a big company. Then there is one more multiple: how much smarter are you than your job description expects you to be? Suppose another multiple of three. Combine all these multipliers, and I’m claiming you could be 36 times more productive than you’re expected to be in a random corporate job. [2] If a fairly good hacker is worth $80,000 a year at a big company, then a smart hacker working very hard without any corporate bullshit to slow him down should be able to do work worth about $3 million a year.

An inescapable part of the pitch is that we startup folks should work 3X as hard for 2X the number of hours.

I don’t buy it. I might be able to work 3X as hard for half the hours, and if I’m truly exceptional, work that hard for 1X the hours. But after 1.5X the hours in a given week, my work quality is diminishing. And if I do that for 2 months in a row, it’s abysmal.

The problem becomes when you find whatever the healthy pace is for your startup and your employees, and then you need to change it. I’ve seen both sides of this.

On one end of the pendulum is the startup at breakneck speed trying to slow down, build a bit more process, and scale up with new hires who aren’t built for 80hrs/week. They end up with conflicts of culture and accusations around commitment and people who don’t know how to slow down or what to do with a life outside work growing angry and resentful at the new “normal.”

On the reverse side of that pendulum is the startup that takes a more balanced approach to working hours finding themselves facing a critical moment, like we recently did. Hours are suddenly way up, and many of us who aren’t used to it find our nerves more frayed, our communication more challenging, and our friends/families more angered by our unavailability.

So is it the case that we’re tied to a single speed? That our gears can’t move up or down? I don’t think so, but I do think expectations and transparent communications are the only way to solve for this. Going into the last couple months, we’ve tried to be really honest with the Moz team about the crunch and the all-hands-on-deck mentality. For 90% of the people 90% of the time, I think it’s worked. And for the 10%, I hope we can make it up to them, and I hope we can do better next time. While part of me hopes there is no next-time at this pace, another part of me knows that times like these are when we get to test our mettle and see if our hard work can earn customers’ praise and business. Every now and then, it can be exhilarating and inspiring to test your accomplishments in that fashion.

—————

One of the toughest parts of today’s conversation was the request Brandon made. He wanted me to bring up entitlement and talk about how it could become a worrying trend and something we need to address. But, as I expressed to him in our discussion, I feel like I’m not in a position to do it. Yes, I’m the CEO, but that’s precisely the problem. CEOs have it easy – they get to set the rules and change them. They can decide whether this particular trip on the company’s dime is worthwhile or not. They can determine how many hours they work in a given week, and no one gets to say otherwise. They can slide on their project dates and no one calls them on it. They have the greatest ability to influence which sodas go in the fridge or which benefits make the cut. And, since their salaries tend to be so high, perks and benefits matter less to them; they can afford all that stuff anyway.

I feel like a total asshole if I stood up in front of 130 people who work at a company where I own nearly 25% of the stock, and asked them to “feel more happiness” at the benefits we provide and to “stop being entitled” about massages or snacks or retina-display monitors. I don’t think I could do it. I don’t think it would be right.

But, while CEOs may not have the moral authority, we do have the obligation, the hierarchical authority (my least favorite kind), and the pressure (internal and external) to keep our teams happy and productive. If the fight against hedonic adaptation can make a difference to both, it deserves at least some investment. Maybe I can find a way to talk about these issues in a way that is empathetic and generous, and recognizes the complexities and balance around all these issues.

p.s. Or maybe I could ask Brandon himself to talk about it. He’s a very compelling debater. Delegation FTW!

p.p.s. After initially publishing this post with Brandon anonymously cited as a “senior engineer,” he gave me permission this morning to include his name in the post. I’m grateful for that, and very grateful to him for bringing it up with me yesterday.

Great post Rand! I think the fact that you’re having “office hours” meetings with your team, publicly putting this info out there, and obviously seem like you’re thinking about the issues deeply, is a lot more empathetic than your typical CEO.

I think there is a large issue with entitlement in the tech/startup field, yet at the same time, these are talented individuals that have possibly given up other opportunities to be where they currently are. When things start to get a little overwhelming it’s natural to become stressed, and start holding on to the little things like perks that don’t matter much in the end game. I think the more you can get your team’s input on what they really value most, and what drives them to work for Moz, you could try to prioritize what might need to go, and what really needs to stay or get taken to the next level to energize the team.

Good luck, I know you guys will do great

http://moz.com/Rand Rand Fishkin

Thanks Jacob! I really liked collecting that feedback, but as Christina pointed out in her comment, what matters to one person isn’t important to another. Getting input, as you suggest (and other in the comments have, too) seems like it’s a must.

http://www.perfectlyplausible.com/ Iain Bartholomew

It’s interesting, because I would have instinctively thought that having a high level of transparency would have been at least a partial salve to this particular pain point. l wonder, though, whether the types of complaints you mention are really complaints at all and not just benign expressions of momentary displeasure. “They never have Diet Pepsi any more”, as complaints go, doesn’t seem to me the sort of dissatisfaction that lingers much beyond the instant it is expressed.

Maybe one approach to perks that removes entitlement is to have those for which it is appropriate on a rotation? Perhaps have staff involvement in setting the rotation, introducing new ideas, etc.

http://moz.com/Rand Rand Fishkin

I totally agree that having the team involved in the decision making, maybe through a poll or voting process, could help make it feel less frustrating. Some ownership in the balance sheet is always a good thing. Great suggestion Iain.

Chris Bridgett

I lol’d at the p.s.

And re. the post, I think just the fact that you’re thinking about these kinds of things in such depth (and that Moz staff can read this post and know that you are) will help everyone in the company understand why certain changes may or may not be made.

JeffreyAllen

I believe that part of the issue is not trusting the team to help come up with the solution. The team may be able to provide insight on the decision between cutting back on new office furniture and stopping conference travel that test managers assumptions. Perhaps they really feel that the best thing for their careers and the company is to attend these events and that is worth working on a cardboard box for 6 extra months. Or perhaps they just spend the conference in a Scotch induced haze and realize that having a nice workspace is more important.

I know you can’t always include everyone, but I do think it is important to have an advisory group that helps make decisions such as these so management isn’t assuming what the individual contributes care about.

http://moz.com/Rand Rand Fishkin

It definitely gets harder as you scale up, but I agree that having people involved in any the process (where possible) is both healthy and important.

Jeff Baumgarten

Such a great post Rand.

A few thoughts:

That you’re being generous is a misnomer. You’re doing with perks & benefits what you believe is needed to thrive as a company. Labeling it as generosity may in itself be helping to create the feelings of entitlement.

But therein lies the rub. Entitlement has a strong negative connotation, yet at its core, simply means that everyone who works there is indeed entited to receive these benefits as they are…until you change them. If you continue to live TAGFEE, continue to innovate, continue to listen to your staff, you should be fine. However, there’s no way to predict the future of the market.

Operating from a place of worry of what will happen if things change negatively helps nobody. The pragmatic discussions and plans you mention do. Further, the more transparent you are with the company’s balance sheet, the more everyone will understand to what they’re entitled…and how they can avoid putting it at risk.

One other note, your gut is right on the timing and productivity issues. Don’t fall prey to the “cult of startup ego” implicit in Paul’s dogma. All that “corporate BS” in big companies is just a result of psychology, not merely org bloat. Keep your ears open and don’t restrict yourself to listening to fellow entrepeneurs.

I wish I were in the market for a CMO gig…I’d come work for you in a heartbeat.

Christina

This is a hard one, what’s important to one person is not important to another. My rules are to make sure we all have a great work / home life balance. People get paid for the hours they put in, rewards are given when they aren’t expected.

http://moz.com/Rand Rand Fishkin

Unexpected rewards are really important. We actually talked about that, too, and how it feels special and wonderful to receive benefits that aren’t anticipated. The way our minds process this stuff fascinates and scares me

http://www.iloveseo.net Gianluca Fiorelli

Sincerely, being a freelancer, I’ve read this post of yours very quietly and with a certain distance, because I don’t live and possibly won’t experience nothing similar as these hamletic doubts you have.
And as the freelancer I would love to have all those benefits I see company offers to their employees in the States. For me they aren’t perks: they are necessities I have to work hard for having them satisfied, and in some cases I simply must work hard because I legally I am obliged to have them satisfied (i.e.: social security monthly fees, private assurance…).

Paid-paid vacation, favorite beer in my fridge and that Nutella jar all for me: actually I have to work hard for having all three, they are not coming in the package (and then Google comes with an update while I’m enjoying my paid-paid by myself vacation).

Maybe not knowing this other perspective of things is what doesn’t help employees understanding the value, the “exceptionality”, of working in a Company offering those perks/benefits, hence to give them for granted.

On the other hand, how to admin the perks… well, that is one of reason I think I probably won’t create a formal agency :)… I would probably get crazier trying to solve that kind of problem than dealing with a Balrog Update by Google.

http://www.barryadams.co.uk/ Barry Adams

Slightly off-topic, but that Paul Graham quote on developer productivity is utter and total bollocks.

But then I find that a lot of the thinking that emerges from Silicon Valley is utter and total bollocks. SV culture is a navel-gazing techno-fetishistic quasi religion totally out of touch with the real world.

http://milkmen.com/ milkmen

Amen

http://moz.com/Rand Rand Fishkin

Totally agree that the quote isn’t accurate for the vast majority of startuppers. Unfortunately, it is still held as the “common wisdom” and I think will be for a long time to come.

http://nomorecreditcards.com/about-us/ Paul Paquin

Naturally few employees will have the work ethic, like the CEO of any company and especially if they
are paid a salary. Their skin is not in it, like ours is.

Naturally the owners of a company will have their heart in the game, way more than employees. Some things you just can’t change.

Giving employees perks like you give is a great idea and creates an amazing work
atmosphere, making it more enjoyable to work there. I love the fact that you buy a gourmet lunch
buffet for your office on a daily basis. Don’t stop that!

The first 40 hours of the work week are the hours where employees are fresh and can
get the most of their time in regards to performance. If they can accomplish what potentially could
take 80-100 hours, in 40 hours, that is the preferred outcome.

I wanted to mention a few ideas for you in regards to getting the most out of employees, while keeping
them excited and happy.

First off, I am sure they all have some type of time management system that they work under, right? There
are so many time management systems out there.

Some people use basic systems such as Gmail or Outlook task/time management tools, while other companies have their own internal system for time management. Moz should create some type of time management system for businesses. I would buy it. You guys have so many other great online marketing tools. This would
be an excellent add on. Anyways, having a task/time management system goes a long way.

You will notice your employees get more done if they have an efficient time management system in place that allows them to manage their micro tasks, long term projects, etc… This is my first thought for you.

Second, do you offer any type of cash or even paid vacation bonuses for employees, when they complete
projects? So your teams have a set of projects and goals that need to be achieved or completed this week, right? What about if they complete it in 50 hours, they can get a little cash bonus, or next week they only have to work 40 hours and still get paid for 50? Many times without offering this incentive it could take them 80 or 100 hours to finish a project or reach their goals, but now they are motivated to get it done in 40 hours because they know that next week they won’t have to work as much and they
will still get paid for their full hours.

Employees are often motivated most if they know the prize is to work less next week. This strategy could lead
to you having a reduction in your salaries, while seeing an increase in production.

Doc Sheldon

Very good post, Rand – a topic I imagine you’ve mullws over many nights while trying to get to sleep. I think that many people lose sight of the fact that perks, demands, urgency, benefits, opportunity and a host of other considerations in any work environment are seen through very different lenses, depending upon one’s position in the organization.

With 100+ team members, there will certainly be a handful that will feel “entitled” – those that would “bitch if they were hung with a new rope”, as my dad used to say. On the other end of the scale, there will be those that are prepared to totally sacrifice their personal life in service to the brand. Both are unrealistic. But they’re also inevitable, so I think you simply have to address those instances on a case-by-case basis.

Sarah makes a very valid point. In fact, in my opinion, her argument is probably the most pressing. But I think there’s a solution to that. You probably already have it in place, but I suspect you may not be living by it rigidly. (I can just imagine you bristling at the term “rigidly”, but in some things, it’s necessary, at least to some degree)

It’s an itemized budget. You surely already have one, but is it in a file cabinet or is it in every manager’s hands? You set up a detailed budget, with line-items for every single expenditure you currently have. After you cull or adjust those that need it, you cast them in stone for the budget term. Engineering doesn’t get $5.2MM for the year… they get a number of fixed budget amounts that happen to add up to $5.2MM. If they run out of money for equipment, they may have to buy a used plotter instead of a new one, or do without a new RAID server until the next quarter… standard admin stuff. Live within the budget.

And of course, the cost of supplying masseuses, soda and mashed potatoes would be lumped into a line item, too, probably administered by your HR chief. That needs to be a finite amount, too… if people want to see more of one thing, they may need to buy into a decrease of something else. Want to add Monster to the icebox? Mashed potato sculpting may have to be cut in half.

This obviously has no immediate effect on your expenditures. It simply gives more granular visibility to everyone of how much is being spent in each area and the overall impact of those expenditures. That, however, will make it a lot more palatable when Sarah has to tell someone that their new desk will have to wait until the new budget is active, even though the conference travel budget hasn’t yet run dry.

It will also help people have a clearer view of the value of those perks – not just in $ cost, but in trade-off value. I think you’ll find their budget submissions will be more meaningful as they gain that understanding.

I think your idea of delegation may have legs, too. (You’re probably not doing enough of that, anyway. ;p )

http://twitter.com/aleczopf Alec

Great post! I want to introduce a few friendly points of thought from a (probably spoiled) software engineer like myself:

1) Perks (or perquisites) are by definition an entitlement: “A thing regarded as a special *right* or privilege enjoyed as a result of one’s position” (emphasis mine).

2) All compensation is compensation, perks included. If the value of my work stays the same or increases (as I learn more and work longer hours), I would be upset to find that my compensation had decreased.

3) Perks can be a form of economic comparative advantage. Say sodas cost $1 each at retail, and I drink 500 a year in the office. It’s cheaper for all of us for you to provide them in the office, rather than pay me an extra $500. You can buy them in bulk for $0.50 each, and I can spend my time producing elegant code instead of hiking down to the corner store. And if having the caffeine from that soda makes me even 5% more productive, you’ve recouped your $250 investment 16-fold, assuming an $80k/yr salary. If you had a line-item on your budget that allotted $10k toward a savings account that returned you $160k/yr, would you cut it?

As for implementing austerity measures in general, we’ve heard in the news about “shared sacrifice,” and I think that is a crucial concept. The question is how to make that sacrifice truly shared when members of a company have vastly different ownership stakes. If as a 0.1%-owner employee I’m asked to forgo 10% of my compensation (perks included), will the 25%-owner CEO forgo 10% of his total compensation (salary + value of ownership stake)? Alternatively, if you consider the 10% reduction of my $80k/yr salary as my *investment* in the future of the company, what do I get in return? Can you redistribute ownership to compensate employees for the value that you are no longer providing to them (even though they’re still providing equal or additional value to you)?

In a way, these are entitled thoughts. But consider that as an employee, only I am the one fundamentally entitled to my energy and productivity, and I must trade it for the best offer available, keeping in mind my own health, wealth, and happiness. Decreasing compensation in the face of increasing work indicates a trade going sour, and in a liquid labor market like tech, I can always jump ship to a better-paying job. As an employee, I’m probably at your company because I believe in your mission and want to be a part of it. Don’t make me feel like a fool for sticking around – buy me the damn sodas, they’re cheap compared to hiring new people who care about your dreams!

I imagine you’ve heard some of these same things from the engineers with which you’ve had your open conversations. Your TAGFEE code sounds like a very valuable asset to your teams. Thanks for offering your perspective!

http://moz.com/Rand Rand Fishkin

Thanks for the great comment Alec. I think you’ve done a great job of capturing exactly the detail of how people feel about employment, perks, benefits, and salary. The true challenge is the hedonic treadmill effect, where over time, new things that are introduced, feel special/undeserved, will start to become part of what we hold as entitlements and “part of compensation.”

This is a careful balancing act and a tough one, but most certainly worthwhile to get right.

http://twitter.com/aleczopf Alec

Indeed. How do you change the form of perks often enough to hack the hedonic treadmill, yet side-step the natural human loss aversion? Quite a challenge!

Dustin Woodard

Interesting discussion. I once worked at a place that became an ESOP (where all employees become part owners) and it was interesting to see how everyone’s perspective changed on things like perks when they were essentially in your position (as an owner). They began to question which perks were necessary and the sense of entitlement certainly went down.

Also, what motivates individuals? Could you offer alternatives? For example, a once a month mid-day go-to-a-movie w/ co-workers award might be far more motivating then a free massage for some people, while others might go for the massage. Of course, this might make the entitlement issue even worse.

I’d recommend you take a hard look at Intrinsic vs Extrensic motivation, primarily for existing employees (I think the extrinsic rewards do help w/ recruiting). The science has proved over & over again that intrinsic rewards are far more powerful and sustaining then extrinsic rewards. I’m sure you’ve already looked at it & probably use it, but this might be a good reminder.

Dan Peskin

Really interesting discussion. I don’t know if you read Alex Payne’s recent article – Letter To A Young Programmer. One of things that he said which stuck with me was ” When the company-provided keg runs dry, the free lunches are making you fat, and playing the Xbox in the break room is no longer as fun as it used to be, what then? When you find that you now report to a politicking middle manager and not the inspiring CEO who interviewed you, will you still want to be there? Is a supposedly novel working environment enough to sustain you? When everywhere you might consider working looks more or less the same, is the novelty even there?” It’s sort of depressing, but true in a way and I think aligns with the challenge you discuss. I think it’s worth checking out.

For me being pretty young I don’t have a wealth of knowledge, but I used to work at startup with some cool perks and might have a different perspective than everyone else. What I took away from my experience was that yes the excitement surrounding the perks fades and you should accept that that will happen at some point for everyone. However, the relationships you build will be what stands the strength of time. I loved the people I worked with very much. I’m still great friends with a lot of them and I would of loved to keep working with the whole team there. Unfortunately, it was out of our hands and a few poor business decisions meant the company couldn’t continue onward.

While there might be some people that will take money/perks over a great place to work, I would think the people you want working for you are passionate and value the company, their team members, and treat them like a family. If they value that (sounds like they do at Moz based on all the things I’ve read), I feel like the issue of entitlement wouldn’t be that big of an issue in the grand scheme of things. Sure people might complain from time to time, but if they really like who they work with and are offered a competitive salary, I can’t imagine the good people leaving.

With that said, I think the best perks are the perks that strengthen relationships between coworkers. Things like events, outings, and competitions. The way I see it, is events keep perks from getting stale. You can always do something different each quarter/month etc and use it indirectly to team build. At least the value you put in is returned not just by employee happiness but by strengthened relationships which will only keep people around longer. I’m sure as a company scales, it’s not that simple and requires much more budget, but I maybe it’s worth scaling back on the standard daily perks to make a bigger impact on employee wellness.

Anyways just my random thoughts. Thanks for sharing Rand, really love your transparency and getting some inside knowledge to learn more about managing issues like this.

TINYpulse

Great great piece Rand. This topic of happiness and entitlement is something that I think about a lot and talk to other leaders about. From my experience, I think I’ve learned a few things:

-Zappos: Tony Hsieh has done a great job of creating the feeling that everyone who works there is part of a greater cause…to deliver WOW to their customers. Yes, they have a great atmosphere, fun perks, but I think their compensation is just industry average. So his genius is to be able to rally people around a greater cause that keeps motivation high. That’s one thing that I share with our folks, partners, and clients. I tell them that our mission is to “make employees happier” to create a shared sense of greater purpose.

-Choice with Constraints: When it comes to perks, like free soda, I think my past jobs have definitely reinforced the hedonic adaptation theory. With a new company, what I plan to do when we hit goals or allocate new budget for “perks” is to allow the team to debate and choose what they want within budget parameters. These benefits last for a quarter or set time period, and they can re-evaluate afterwards the utility they received and make changes if they want. But I think going through this process creates a more positive experience and increased utility because they drove the process and realize the tradeoffs they made to attain it.

-Reaching Out: I love your office hours and because we’re smaller I’m implementing a Monday one-on-one coffee or happy hour with each employee on a rotating basis, which wouldn’t scale to your size. But recently, CEO’s have been reaching out to me to let me know the Private Message feature we just released in TINYpulse has been a fantastic revelation for them. They’re now able to respond immediately, let the responder know they’ve been heard, and inquire about the respondent’s pathway to resolution for issues they brought up in their responses. And it maintains anonymity throughout the exchange. It’s been one of the fastest features adopted we’ve ever released, and I’m using it to respond and figure out how to address issues like dirty dishes in the sink. I think it could be a nice 1-2 punch along with office hours.

I’m a big fan of what you’ve accomplished and where MOZ is going! I’m confident that you’ll figure out a genius way to balance and address hedonic adaptation, and I can’t wait to read that blog post too. Thanks again for sharing and being so transparent. To happier employees!

Mackenzie Fogelson

Hey Rand. Got a lot out of this post, thanks. We’re only 6 so I can’t imagine what it’s like running the Moz machine. I really appreciate your suggestions for keeping an eye on the perks/benefits that you choose to add to your company and how that might scale as you grow (and being thoughtful about what may happen if you need to take them away).

I’m reading Good to Great right now and your post resonates so well with how important it is to have the right people on the bus so that no matter where the bus is going, you’ve got the right crew. Working in a startup is hard on everyone. Everyone works hard and even though as a CEO you can tell your team that they just need to endure when you have big pushes like re-brand launches or new products, truth is, it will always be something. The difference (IMHO) is in keeping tabs on the gaps between those things and advocating that the team take advantage of that time for balance, breaks, and recharging.

People are people and I’m sure no matter what Moz offers you’ll always find someone who is dissatisfied by how things have changed. Moz is an amazing company with or without the perks.

Thanks for the free coaching

http://www.mikearnesen.com/ Mike Arnesen

Thanks for a great and, as always, incredibly transparent post. I know the topic of this post is something much larger, but the one thing that resonated with me the most was your dilema with publicly “admitting” to taking time out of the office to see Star Trek after a really long day. Your initial feeling that you didn’t want Mozzers seeing you take time off really hit close to home. Thanks for calling that out (calling yourself out, mainly) for being wrong there. It really caused me to reflect on how I, too, have done that kind of thing.

Incredible post Rand. Perhaps I can give you some scope on the situation from a different angle.

The battle with entitlement and hedonic adaption is something that I am actually having an honest brush with currently. Reading this and seeing the perspective from the other side of the fence gives me so much hope in this sort of time. I have more than I could have ever dreamed of 2 years prior, but as I’ve grown accustom to this lifestyle I see and feel as though there is more, and the happiness that I had about where I was in my career seems to be slowly dwindling. I feel like I’m looking for something greater, but feel guilty because I should be focusing on what I have (which is what would ultimately propel me to something greater).

I grew up in a very modest family, two of the largest principles I’ve been taught in my life are humility and acceptance. Humility is the main driving factor behind the guilt that is felt by me upon reaching this level of hedonic adaption. I don’t want it. I don’t want to want more, I want to be happy by being re-invigorated in what brought me happiness before. The honest truth is that I’m grateful for everything I have, and I don’t need any more than I have to be happy (seeing as happiness is not measured through material wealth, or the perks I receive).

What I truly want, and I believe I essentially need (in order to circumvent this emotional state) is something to be truly passionate about, and people to share that with.

I was hired on as “THE” SEO at the agency I work at about a year and a half ago, and at the time they had no one doing true SEO. I was somewhat wet-behind-the-ears with SEO, though I had done a lot of contract work (some for the company that hired me actually). I was extremely excited about SEO, I wanted to do SEO, I wanted to learn every facet of SEO and to seriously improve the agency I was hired on to. So when I got hired I was ecstatic, and I worked my ass off while loving every second of it. I’m not doing much different now, I’m still working my ass off, I know SEO in and out, and have moved on to learn far more, I learned every form of inbound marketing inside and out and found out that SEO is not specifically what intrigues me anymore. Essentially I’m still doing SEO, but I want to be touching on different points, to test my own mettle and improve my skill-set, but also just to do something that truly intrigues me.

I believe this is where the true answer of the hedonic treadmill lies. The effects of perks, payroll and material have diminishing returns, they start to taper off. If you become such an expert at what you’re doing, and you want to do something else to really test yourself, you start to get jittery, you start to get anxious, and in that you aren’t now focusing on what your direct responsibilities are anymore, you are focusing on what you want to do. If you are focusing on what you want to do, and not on what you are doing, but you are extremely good at what you do you will naturally feel that you should be better compensated for doing what you don’t want to do. This would feel like the epitome of entitlement. If a college graduate got out of school for say psychology, but found out they wanted to do marine biology, just because they are very well qualified as a psychologist they would feel as though they should be damn-well compensated for being a qualified psychologist, and they try to surpress their desire with the material gain that comes from doing what you know.

I believe you are spot-on with what you said about getting in front of your faculty and spouting off how “you should feel grateful” that would be a horrible idea. I respect you so much for the stance you take on that matter. I also respect the owner and CEO of my agency so much for what he did for me to ease this problem. We are a pretty small agency, ~15 employees, ~3 or so contractors. My CEO’s schedule isn’t quite as crammed as yours probably is so having a 90 minute window of talks is not really a big deal to him, he makes sure people can just come talk to him whenever they need, or they can call him if they really need to. So one day I went into his office, shut the door, sat down and asked “what can I do here to be of more value, because I feel I’m not doing what I should be doing, or there could be more.” This started a wonderful discussion about teamwork, educating the rest of the office, etc. But what really came out of it is what I had really hoped would come out of it. I love products, I love tinkering with products and making them better. From the tiny details of minut design pieces to the absolute over-arching structure. We have a product, a hyper-niche CMS, that we have done pretty much nothing to promote. We don’t have a very good channel of learning for the CMS, and most of our marketing clients are on that CMS (at least, that’s where the bulk of our cash is). I basically asked if I could draw out the architecture for a new site specifically for the CMS, with a learning center and the works, specifically based on the product, and teaching about the product and it’s use features. Cohesively putting it together in my mind as an inbound marketing effort for the CMS while also educating the users of the CMS.

He agreed that I should definitely map that out, he believed in me and let me chase that passion, even though it is not my direct responsibility (as an SEO, not the marketing director, not the site or design architect). He let me act on what I was interested and inspired to do, and it’s happening, parts are moving and things are getting done. What I wanted to happen is happening, and not only will it make my job easier as an SEO of this system, it will make me extraordinarily happy to work on something that inspires me again. Not to mention I have belief that it will result in a huge benefit for the agency.

I know this is a very long response, but honestly I believe that the answer to your hedonic dilema is not in better perks, it’s not in telling people to get back to work, it’s in motivating your team to do what they are inspired to do. Part of it is the communication, actually most of it is. Communicate that you want to know what people truly want to do, what they are inspired to do, and what ideas they have behind that inspiration. To facilitate that change is a very different thing, but one that I feel could be of great benefit to any company or organization. Google has their famous 20% to yourself time, which I’m not saying is what should be adopted, but it does foster somewhat of the same ideal. If you communicate that you want people to chase what they’re interested in, and then give them the freedom to do that, and then actually help them bring their visions to life, that’s worthy of recognition on any scale.

You have 130 brains that are some of the very best in their categories. I don’t even feel like I’m being modest when I say they are probably 5x more capable than I am, and I have a list of ideas that I would die to see come to fruition.

I hope this helps in some way, sorry for the blog-post response to your own blog post ;D

Keep it #TAGFEE, Seattle.

http://www.digitaldiscovery.com.pt/ Pedro Menezes Pereira

The only thing that cross my mind is……Moz employers have a great work conditions. Thats it Rand.

The human behavior is very hard to predict. And everytime we reach to some goal, in this case perks, they want more….and more….and more. Simple, but I really belive on this…its our nature.

The best thing as you are doing is to listen to people…and that is precious. Your the men and a great boss, believe me lol

I work in Portugal and if any one of your workers, had the possibilitie of experimenting the work conditions that I have, they would see that they are in heaven lol

Great post Rand as always.

Thomas

Well to make a long story short: No, of course you can’t tell anyone to “feel more hapiness” – that Job is already taken by the Human Potential Movement. If you absolutely must tell them something, my suggestion would be “Grow up!” – this phenomenom doesn’t seem to be restricted to the “tech-start-up-world” (by the way: after what period of time do you get from “young-hip-startup” to “company” – didn’t get a letter on that) – it strikes me more as a trend in the zeitgeist, this constant whining by adults about trivial nonsense “My – free! – favourite soda is not in stock right now” – Really?! – “Well, why don’t you go and get some?” unless of course he/she can’t because he/ she feels to tense, cause there was no more free slot with the masseuse. I understand trying to make people happy and cultivate a friendly and productive work enviroment, but everything has it’s limits. Sorry to sound so cranky, but that really brought up my Irish cause that is at least one thing I share with George Carlin – “A very low tollerance level for stupid bullshit.”

http://www.jcdrepair.com/ Matt McCormick

As always, Rand, you write great stuff. Thank you. Maybe I can give a little something back now…

I recently talked with a Chicago CEO named Jon Morris about how he keeps employees happy and he mentioned something his company does that I found interesting: Surprises his employees.

As an example, he once bought all his employees an iPad Mini without telling them. On another occasion, he announced extra days off just a week or two in advance.

This is a nice “perk” for employees but doesn’t become expected because they don’t know when or what is coming.

I recently tried this in my own workplace by buying a couple of baseball tickets for two huge baseball fans in our store (we’re only 5 people so it was about half the staff). They were ecstatic. Two days later they ended up surprising me by buying me lunch. Not because it was expected, but because, I hope, it’s starting to create a culture where people just do nice things for one another out of the blue.

It definitely takes more effort to generate these surprises for your people but I think it’s a good balance between entitlement and cool culture. And it’s something I hope to continue in my own business now that I’ve seen how successful it can be.

Charles Floate

I think calling yourself generous whilst trying to take legal action against a brand new start-up who offered to work with you (Doz) is a bit of a micky-take.

Brandi

Doz… kind of like Moz… really!

http://moz.com/Rand Rand Fishkin

Charles – I hope you read Sarah’s comments in reply to that post. It was a complex and sad situation, but one where the current US trademark laws require us to take action or risk having our trademark rights revoked in the future. We tried to be as communicative and transparent with the CapSEO folks as possible.

Charles Floate

The way you went about it, was still a VERY misguided attempt. In my opinion you could of had a much more friendly approach to this situation, instead of firing your lawyer cannons out there, why not try and work with them? Maybe tell them that in the first place.. Don’t just throw your weight around, I’d rather see you offered him something such as a deal to work with Moz (Like he approached you first). Also Doz is based in Lyon, France – Unless you’re going into International trademark law.. It doesn’t really apply.
I’d off offered Doz to be owned (maybe even like 1%) by Moz, offering them some of your software, more partnerships and then they wouldn’t be infringing on your copyright.

http://moz.com/Rand Rand Fishkin

I know Sarah’s been very open about asking for different opinions on ways that we could have handled the issue. Please feel free to get in touch with her about it – sarah at moz.com. Although the blog post didn’t tell the story that way, we really were extremely communicative and upfront for many months ahead of time, and tried all sorts of tactics and ways to sort things out prior to taking legal action.

Charles Floate

Ok well as Brandi said Doz is kind of like Moz.. It’s not actually Moz though. I get if I built a website like Moz.co and built an SEO blog, but it’s not the same name and it’s not even pronounced the same Considering they offered you a partnership (which you accepted) I think you went a bit too far with this one tbh Rand. Love all your work etc.. but I hope you aren’t the Church of Scientology

David Tripp

Your generosity is very big Jock like your company. I just cancel my account after reading this article.

http://www.seomoz.org/team/aaron Aaron Wheeler

Great post Rand! I love that you had this conversation. Brandon’s an awesome culture resource; I really valued his points at the Netflix culture deck discussions, as one example. I have a few thoughts:

I think it’s actually quite hard to be the CEO. You said that it means you get to set the rules and change them with little accountability. I think the reverse is true! As you mentioned earlier in your post, you are under constant scrutiny. If you make a mistake applying TAGFEE, everyone sees it and feels it. You set rules in a responsive capacity far more often than most managers do at most companies. When /anyone/ at the company misses an important project deadline, we look towards you. You might have it easy in that you can’t take all the actions yourself, but you have it tough in that you must take soft and passive action across the board to effect change. As you know, that’s how you actually build culture! Not by setting rules from the top-down. I’d say being effective at the former is a lot harder.

Of course, I totally agree that hedonistic adaptation is an issue here at Moz and universally. I’ve thought about it a lot, actually, since I’ve also been adapting over the years here. It sort of scares me to imagine needing to work somewhere else without the benefits we have here. As a package, what we have at Moz are weight-bearing perks! If we took them away, it’d feel like the whole thing would come down. I don’t think it would work for perks like medical and dental, but what would you think about making perks somehow less static? For instance, maybe we change some perks once a year, e.g., this year we have paid paid vacation and gym benefits. Next year we have an all-company week-long retreat and a fitness stipend. We could do this for smaller scale things, like having catered lunches in winter but not in summer. I guess I’m just brainstorming examples that make perks more timely and less established. Ways that make you remember that the perks are there and that they’re special. There must be some way to do it!

As a society, we’re addicted to newness. Unfortunately, I think the most /exciting/ thing about any perk is that it’s new. This will always be the case. Perhaps by taking on something like what I mentioned we can make perks seem new more often. I think that’s the crux: making it so that, by the time we’ve adapted to having something, it’s replaced by something else (planned and communicated ahead of time).

Anyways, it’s a great question to ask and I love thinking about ways to answer it. Thanks for bringing it up!

Andrew

Really interesting article. I am managing my second start up agency, and feel your pain. I believe in expressing a high degree of empathy and genuine gratitude to all of my staff. Perks, benefits, etc… all become somewhat expected once you start to give them. There is no way around it. If an employee receives a certain bonus 2 years in a row, they spend their year 3 bonus in their mind before it is actually received. If they do not receive it, they either think: 1) the company is not doing well, 2) They are no longer as respected, 3) The owners are being greedy.

It is sort of like moving into a new big house. At first, the major upgrade feels amazing and special. A few years in, that is just how you are living. Needing to move into a smaller house feels like a downgrade, or you are failing.

This gets especially challenging as you add more staff, which equals more risk. In the agency word, losing one key client can crush your bottom line. If you are staffed at 5-8 people, this becomes manageable. If you are staffed at 20-30, you need more cash cushion to weather any storms. Obviously, giving perks to a staff of 5-8 is much more manageable. Once the perks become expected “compensation”, you have backed yourself into a corner in revenues dip.

The real answer to employee satisfaction is time and appreciation. I also offered the “open door” policy where any staff can come speak with me. It was rarely used. Offering access and creating access are two different stories. Some techies can also be introverts, which makes approaching them more critical.

Employees need to know you care about them personally. Perks are great and can be streamlined, but it is all about managers and C level employees spending genuine time with their staff. Proactively knowing if they are having personal issues and giving advice. Telling them “Great job on that assignment”. Setting the tone for the work day with some jokes and telling them how excited you are to be there. Knowing them personally. Vocally appreciating tiny small things they may have done to complete a project, showing them you are mentally invested in their craftsmanship (ex. brilliant idea to change the layout of that page FYI…).

Most of all, employees want to feel a part of something bigger, with a roadmap to future success and growth. Tell them where you see their career growing. What is their future like? What special skills do they bring to the table? Invest in their minds and how they feel. No perk can match this type of satisfaction.

Also, make sure you are hiring the right people that will respond to this type of management. Sometimes the most talented people aren’t the best fits. Hiring a number of high talent hired guns, creates a vibe where everyone is “trying to get theirs”. They start spreading the message internally, calculating how much their bosses are making.. etc. No employee’s talent level is worth the amount of corruption they can cause.

Bottom line is, C level employees need to get involved. They need to hire mid management that is likable are truly wants to interact and help their team members grow mentally… not just their paychecks and perks. All humans seek happiness, and money and perks do not achieve this. Perks and bonuses become expected, and you are grooming a culture where your staff will always be looking for more more more. This falls into the strategy of recruiters (which through linkedin try to steal staff members daily). They will find a better pot of gold with more perks! More bonuses! (most of the time it is a mirage).

Be a great coach that cares, and your staff will run through a wall for you. When the recruiters call, the first thing they should think is “I am appreciated and loved here and have an awesome boss… i believe in where this company is going and I want to go along for the ride. My boss is also my mentor and believes I can achieve great things.” At the end of the day, that is what makes your staff happy. Open office hours does not equal true employee engagement. That has to be pro-actively done on a day to day basis. Open office hours will attract extroverts with complaints, and employees looking to further their career by getting to know their boss.

Jan Boshoff

Great post, thanks for sharing!
I recently read DRIVE, by Dan Pink. It’s about motivating people in today’s world. I found it really interesting that according to the research he presents, people (especially creative people) are not motivated by perks or bonuses nearly as much as you might expect. In fact, those things often backfire and almost always have a diminishing return over time. Dan posits (and shows through research results) that people are motivated primarily by the following factors: Autonomy (freedom to choose how they work), Mastery (being challenged and encouraged to grow in skill), Purpose (having a higher and more enduring cause than themselves). Create a work environment which ticks those boxes, and then going to work becomes a perk.

http://www.thingsareokay.com/ OneJillian

Speaking as one who has only experienced being “the employee” at large, medium, small, and tiny businesses, Rand, your discussion of this topic is amazing.

I’ve never, ever seen a “struggle” where providing perks, adding or subtracting expenses, or even revealing costs of any part of the business are concerned. I’ve only received notification that “this is happening” or “this is no longer happening” and have been left to draw my own conclusion.

Yours is the first truly sincere discussion of this kind of issue. I love that you are bold enough to pull back the curtain on this, one of the more sensitive parts of business where there are any employees to consider.

http://twopens.com/ Cynthia Hartwig

The more levels that accrue in a growing business like Moz, the lonelier and less connected the CEO gets at the top. The way I would tweak your idea of having open office hours (which depends on the brassiest of employees to take you up on your open door policy) is to invite 3-4 employees from different groups to a brown bag lunch with you bi-monthly. Go with a wide range of employees from VPs to mail room to get a range of input. Your job is to ask everybody to bring up one thing that is either a problem or opportunity they see from their vantage spot in the pond.

On a different topic, you’re not doing so hot on the goal I heard you state at the Microsoft SEO Summit re blogging 5 x a week. I count 1 post in June and 2 in May! Would still love to help you build out an editorial calendar based on your PPT presentations and pre-draft posts for you so that your blog moves to the top of your to-do pile. You can trade me a MozCon ticket for a week of posts

http://www.acsius.com/ Arun Singh

Excellent post thanks. It is indeed very comforting to be part of a team and to be able to speak up what is in your mind. However, the real success of such initiative will come with what is really happening after the talk!

Phu Bui

I’m quite late to the party, but I loved the post! It’s awesome to get a very raw and very real glimpse into the mind of a CEO. Cool stuff.

I used to work at one of the “best places to work in Texas”, and I definitely sensed the entitlement bug going around the office. The company gave the usual tech-y perks – free food, on-site gym, work from home options – but before I came on board, employees got free tickets to basketball games and had a masseuse regularly coming in. As the company grew, the perks went in the opposite direction, and people didn’t like that so much. I saw this reflected negatively in the company’s reviews on glassdoor.com, but I never really understood all the disgruntled-ness.

Maybe it’s because I’m a simple guy or maybe it’s because I grew up never having an allowance and having to take care of myself. Maybe it’s because I’ve worked at companies with very few benefits (let’s just say I currently work at a “famously frugal” company) or at companies where morale is horrifyingly low. Either way, we are all susceptible to falling into the trap of entitlement, and it’s a sad part of human nature.

I really wish I had a solution for you, but my best suggestion is to remind everyone of what it really means to be TAGFEE. Generosity is a two-way street, and while receiving awesome perks is fun for the recipient, I think it’s also quite generous to sacrifice (on occasion) some of your niceties for the growth of the company or the betterment of your peers. It’s also very empathetic (two in one!).

All the best to you, Rand!

Geeky Developer

Great post! I have a small challenge for you though.
Have you considered the treadmill effect the other way as well? Management getting used to a heightened level of output from employees and then no longer appreciating the effort, and when removed, they become upset? I think there’s a balancing act on both sides, and that over time employees learn to limit possible output least management get too used to them working late nights then lament the loss of commitment when output is reduced to normal levels. I think you touched upon the idea in the article, but would curious if you’ve ever fully considered it flipped like this; the employee evaluating if they are giving too many “perks and benefits” (weekends, late hours, home study) to the company.

marshallmews

Your site content is very good. I like it

Howdy! I'm Rand

Co-founder of Moz and Inbound.org, startup junkie, frequent traveler, blogger, social media addict and evangelist of all things TAGFEE. More about me here.